


you could make this place beautiful

by sophiegaladheon



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Anxiety, Communication, Couch Cuddles, Cuddling & Snuggling, Domestic Fluff, Fluff, Food as a Metaphor for Love, Jack Zimmermann's Overdose, Kissing, Lack of Communication, Multi, Non-Linear Narrative, POV Multiple, Profanity, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, non-explicit references to underage teen sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-30
Updated: 2019-05-30
Packaged: 2020-03-29 16:09:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,299
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19023355
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sophiegaladheon/pseuds/sophiegaladheon
Summary: Eric Bittle has thirteen soulmates.  Thirteen.  A baker’s dozen of soulmates.  There was something appropriate about that.  It fit.





	you could make this place beautiful

**Author's Note:**

> Here is my story for the OMGCP Reverse Bang! It was inspired by a wonderful piece of art by KARIN, who you can find on tumblr at [karin848](https://karin848.tumblr.com/).  
> EDIT: [Here is the direct link to KARIN's amazing art!](https://karin848.tumblr.com/post/185255009551/excited-to-post-my-second-piece-for-the) Check it out!
> 
> The title is from the poem "Good Bones" by Maggie Smith.

Kent Parson has seven soulmates. Lucky number seven, everyone always said. His soulmates would undoubtedly bring good fortune into his life. At least, that’s what the superstitions and suppositions about soulmates and soulmate numbers always said. Kent isn’t so sure.

By the time he reaches eighteen, he’s only had one of his soul-markings resolve. For a long time, he hadn’t had any, and that’s the sort of thing that got you funny looks and raised eyebrows and just didn’t get mentioned in public. It’s not unheard of, but it is a bit unusual and for a while he was getting a bit worried (as much as he could be concerned about anything that wasn’t hockey), but then he met Jack.

When the marking on his arm resolved, matched to the one on Jack’s chest, he’d been excited. When they’d started playing together, being put on the same line, he’d been ecstatic.

Some people spent years after they met a soulmate trying to figure out what impact they were supposed to have on one another. Sometimes it took a lifetime. Yet here he was, with his first resolved soulmate, and it was so completely obvious. He and Jack were hockey soulmates, meant to push and support and challenge one another. To make each the other better, and grow better in return.

Kent was playing better hockey than he ever had in his life, with someone whose skill and drive made him want to get up every morning and work harder, be better. And, once he got past all the reserve and awkward stammering (and the myth and whispered gossip) Jack was a pretty cool guy, too.

It was incredible. Kent loved this soulmate shit.

And, like, it wasn’t as though he didn’t notice Jack—Zimms, now, they were Zimms and Kenny—was attractive. It was impossible not to, between the amazing hockey and the clear blue eyes and the quiet, shy laugh that Kent took an almost ridiculous amount of pride in provoking. But Kent had been watching and playing, eating and breathing hockey practically his whole life and he knew the score.

You could have your hockey soulmate, and you could have your romantic soulmate, but it just didn’t do to combine those types of relationships. Even if you managed to avoid the homophobic sports culture bs (and that was a big if, Kent had spent enough time in locker rooms to know that) there was just too much at risk on the professional side to go messing with the personal.

Hockey soulmates were hockey soulmates because they played great hockey together, made each other better players. And Kent wants that, wants it so badly it’s like an ache in his bones. He knows it’s like that for Zimms too. The dream, the goal of the NHL is worth too much to risk.

And that was even assuming that Zimms is gay, or bi, or some other version of potentially interested in Kent in that way. There was simply no chance, no matter how much Kent wanted to kiss him. So, he did what he always does and shoved his feelings aside as hard as he could under some over-enthusiastic cellies and wrestling matches and focused on his hockey. And everything is fine because he has hockey, and he has Zimms, and Kent knows as long as he has those two things, he will be okay.

Until of course it turns out that Zimms is gay, or bi, or some other version of interested in Kent in that way and everything gets _so much better_.

Kent never really believed in those Hallmark movie, Harlequin novel, ‘true love’s kiss will solve all your problems’ fantasy stories told about romantic soulmates. And he still doesn’t after kissing Zimms because that shit’s ridiculous. But, and he would never admit this, even to Zimms, even on his deathbed, he kind of gets where those books and movies are coming from.

It’s not the magical fireworks and everything’s perfect of fiction, but Kent’s a seventeen-year-old guy, he’s hooked up before and being with Zimms is nothing like those awkward, fumbling, fun but not fantastic experiences. Sure, there’s fumbling and awkwardness—they’re teenagers, of course there is—but being with Zimms (kissing Zimms, having sex with Zimms, sharing a bed with Zimms and cuddling on their rest days) is like being on the ice with him.

Kent honestly isn’t sure if it’s because their soul-bond is supposed to cover this too or just a side effect of their hockey connection, but it’s just so easy to be with Jack. It always was, even before they started hooking up. He doesn’t ask, and neither does Jack. Maybe they’re too young, or maybe they’re too busy, or maybe Jack’s too caught up in his own head and Kent’s too caught up in Jack—maybe (Kent realizes in retrospect) it’s all of the above—but they don’t talk about what it means.

And then they win the Memorial Cup and the draft and the specter of their futures loom large but there’s still a month of idyllic, empty summer until then and they still don’t talk about it. They don’t talk about what it means that they are hockey soulmates who will undoubtedly go one and two in the draft and be playing against each other rather than with each other next year. What their hooking up—and could Kent still call it hooking up when it had been more than a year and he’d met Zimms’ parents and they’d spent what seemed like every waking moment together?—meant for their bond and did they want a romantic bond?

Kent sure did. He was pretty sure they had one. But he didn’t know about Zimms. Because they didn’t talk about it.

In retrospect, it is easy to see where it all went wrong.

Or maybe not. Kent’s therapist assures him that it’s difficult to find a single, simple answer for things like this, and no matter how much he might wish he had insisted he and Zimms talk about their relationship (or his anxiety, or really anything other than the superficial hockey stuff all their conversations seemed to turn into—yes, Kent is aware that he needs to learn to communicate better for more reasons than guilt-riddled nostalgia) there is no guarantee anything would have changed in the long run. Kent kind of hates her for that, since it implies him and Jack had what they had and whatever that was it was all they were meant to be. 

He’s not entirely sure if that makes sense either. It might just be him projecting (and yes, he knows a lot of it probably is him projecting) but even the ‘we were just hockey soulmates who were meant to help one another through Juniors and get to the big show’ argument doesn’t really hold water when only Kent made it, when only Kent is still playing hockey. (Okay, Zimms is playing NCAA now, and Kent totally doesn’t watch his games over the internet whenever he can, and he does still look great and plays beautiful hockey even if the rest of the losers on his team can’t keep up with him and that’s just embarrassing. But whatever.) 

This soulmate shit is supposed to be reciprocal, and the current setup looks an awful lot like Kent got everything out of the deal and Jack got nothing. And, like, Kent knows that isn’t fair, he might be an asshole but he isn’t _that_ much of an asshole and anyway, he isn’t stupid. If Kent’s fuckup is what derailed Jack’s career (yes, he knows some of that was Jack, he knows it isn’t all on him, the therapy is doing some good, see? But Kent certainly didn’t help and that’s what he was supposed to do) then it’s up to him to do his bit to help Jack get back on track to the NHL. Which would certainly be easier if Jack would, like, take his calls.

But it isn’t like Kent has all the free time in the world to go around obsessing over Jack (no, he doesn’t, shut up Jeff.) He’s got an NHL team to captain and all that comes with it, the world’s most wonderful cat to spoil, and a life that very much does not involve Jack Zimmermann. Whether or not that absence feels like a gaping hole in his chest some days is not the point. Kent has a life. A busy, successful life, without Jack. Jack does not want to speak with him. Kent can figure this out. It’s fine. 

Even though it has been years since the swirling smudge on his forearm has resolved into a line of neat, slanting letters, the composition of which science has determined to be as inert and harmless as a freckle, some days Kent finds his hand clenched into a fist, nerves singing in protest at the cut of his nails into his palm, as those intimately familiar characters sit on his skin and burn.

* * *

If you had ever asked Kent, before this moment, if he could possibly fuck up his life more than he already had, he probably would have said yes. For all he doesn’t look it, he does possess some self-awareness and he’s screwed up enough by now to know that he has a substantial capacity for mistakes. Not enough to get him to stop making them, but, you know, some.

His problem, he thinks, is that he’s only ever able to see the magnitude of his mistakes after he’s committed them. Which is great for self-recrimination, but not for healthy relationships.

Jeff frowns at him when he says this, face pressed into the rough weave of the hotel duvet as he tries not to cry. “Self-pity isn’t helpful to anyone, Parser,” he says and throws a pillow at him.

Kent groans and rolls over. He could swear the back of his neck itches, but scratching at the spot does nothing to help. 

He’s probably fucked up his relationship with Jack beyond all repair. If it wasn’t already, and he was just too blind to see it. His stomach curdles at the memory of the things he had said to Jack—things he knew, even as he said them, would go straight for Jack’s sore spots and bury deep—at the way he tried, at the way he _knows_ he hurt him. His fingers twitch with the urge to pick up his phone, to type out an apology and beg forgiveness. But he forces himself still, to lie in the dark and to try and go to sleep.

While he is stupid enough to say cruel and hurtful things to Jack, stupid enough to try and talk to him in the first place, he is not stupid enough to try and apologize now. Apologies have never been something he has been good at and with this, he needs to be sure to do it right. Early in the morning, dead tired, and dripping self-loathing are none of the ideal conditions to make an apology under, especially not for him.

So, he sleeps, or tries to, twisting and turning until he’s tangled in the rough hotel sheets in the early hours of the morning. As the grey winter sunlight filters in under the insufficient blackout curtains, he drags himself up, head still heavy with exhaustion, and ignores Jeff’s still-snoring form as he shuts himself in the bathroom.

The shower helps a little, and he’s feeling a little less groggy as he dries off and pulls on fresh clothes. The phantom itch on the back of his neck is still there, and he twists his head around to try and see in the mirror as he brushes his teeth.

Toothpaste drips on the counter in an ugly mess, his toothbrush dangling from slack lips as he catches sight of the base of his neck. Scrawled in neat, looping cursive, in place of a soulmark indicator Kent barely ever remembered he had, is a resolved name. _Eric_. 

Damn. 

Kent carefully spits out the remaining toothpaste and wipes the drool off of his chin. He takes a deep breath and then another as he tidies up the sink and puts away his toiletries.

This is not something he wants to deal with right now. This is not something he needs to be dealing with, right now. The soulmate relationships he already has range from strained and hesitant to a downright shitshow, with the sole exception of Jeff and Kent still isn’t sure how he’s managed to have that work out so well. Kent is not, he’s pretty sure, exactly fantastic soulmate material, and trying to figure out a whole new relationship, with a stranger, while his general emotional state can best be described as a mess, does not sound like a fantastic plan.

And this _Eric_ is someone he met at the party last night. At Samwell. At the hockey frat. Where Jack lives. _Eric_ , for all Kent knows, could know Jack. And that is not something he wants to think about.

By the time Jeff wakes up, Kent is sitting in the one chair in the room, drinking a cup of terrible hotel room coffee. His bags are packed and he’s dressed and ready to go.

If Jeff wonders why Kent is awake so obscenely early, or why he’s bundled up in a coat, hat, and scarf indoors, he looks at the forced smile on Kent’s face, accepts the second cup of terrible coffee, and doesn’t say anything.

* * *

Jack Zimmermann has 10 soulmates. A nice, even number, that. His first mark to resolve did so shortly after he was born and the second one didn’t until he was sixteen years old. That was okay, though, because his first soulmate was his papa, and Jack couldn’t have asked for anyone better.

Jack’s parents never really thought much about Jack and his father being soulmates—after all, parent-child bonds were common, nothing unusual or extraordinary about it. And Bob had always so wanted to be a father that the bond only made him even more ridiculously pleased with himself, and with his wife, and with their son. It gave his teammates more material to chirp him about how ridiculously stupid in love with his family he was. Bob didn’t mind.

The press, on the other hand, made a big deal over Jack’s first soulmark. They shouldn’t have known, of course, but people are nosey and unscrupulous and entitled, and the information got out to the public. 

And so, from the time Jack first stepped foot on the ice as a tiny toddler, there were gossip columns and hockey blogs speculating about him following in his father’s footsteps. They would have anyway, but the soulmark sealed the deal for most people and made things ten times worse.

Jack didn’t mind the speculation, primarily because he didn’t know it existed. His parents did a good job of keeping him away from the sort of news outlets that would spend their inches commenting on a young child’s hockey prospects. Even if he did know about it in the abstract, they liked to think, it probably wouldn’t bother him too much, given how much he wanted to be like his papa anyway. But it was best to avoid that sort of thing in general.

But, of course, secrets can’t be kept forever, especially when the secret is known by all but one and, as previously mentioned, people are nosey and entitled. Even seven-year-olds can’t escape the curiosity and judgment of their peers, and most certainly not when said seven-year-old is the son of a hockey legend and his peers are the members of his novice hockey team. 

When Jack comes home from practice with a furrow carved between his eyebrows and a crumpled tabloid magazine shoved in his gear bag Bob and Alicia know they're in for another tough family conversation, one more bit of privacy and childhood innocence sacrificed at the altar of their careers. Nothing really changes, Jack seems to take it well, the added pressure and expectations that his parents have always tried to keep from him, and they go back to their hectic lives and, in their busy schedules, almost forget why they were so worried in the first place.

Jack goes back to hockey. He loves it, has from the first moment he stepped on the ice, probably from the first time he saw his papa play, although he cannot pinpoint the precise memory of when that was. His—he’s not going to say his friends, but kids he goes to school with, kids he plays with, sometimes joke that he must have a soulmark that just says ‘hockey’ because nothing and no-one is more important to him.

It’s a stupid joke, Jack knows, because soulmates are always people and anyway you couldn’t reciprocate a bond on an inanimate thing. Jack loves hockey but he knows hockey doesn’t love him. And anyway, Jack knows one of his soulmates, and having his papa as a soulmate is almost the same thing as having hockey somedays, only it’s better because with papa he gets hockey _and_ warm hugs _and_ Timbits on the way to the airport, even if that also means papa is leaving again.

When he tells his maman this, perfectly matter of fact over the dinner table one night when his papa is away with his team, it makes her smile but he can’t tell if it’s a happy smile or a sad one. He thinks maybe it’s both. It’s the same smile he sees again when he comes home with a creased and crumpled magazine and a hundred questions that all boiled down to one.

“Does this mean I’m supposed to play like papa?” he’d asked, tapping the name on his wrist that was usually hidden by a soft leather bracelet. He’d always known his parents had given it to him to hide his soulmark, that wasn’t unusual for kids his age, but now he couldn’t help wondering if there was something more to it.

His maman had smiled that unreadable smile and his papa had told him no, that it was up to him to decide what his soulmark meant.

“You can only play like yourself, _mon fils_ ,” he’d said, and wrapped Jack in a hug. “That’s all anyone can do.” 

His papa usually gives good advice, especially about hockey, so Jack tries to listen. He tries to focus on his hockey, on playing the best he can, on learning how _he_ plays best and not worrying how much it’s like or not like anyone else's. But he can't help but think about it, sometimes.

Because he’s good. He knows he’s good, with the kind of deep-seated confidence of someone who’s been told as such for as long as he can remember by the kind of people whose opinions matter about these kinds of things, but also as someone who has had that praise after practices and matches where that confidence played out. He can’t help but worry that he should be better, somehow, or different. Because the good of a seven-year-old is not the good of a professional, and there is never a guarantee that one will translate to the other.

The worry knots in his chest and keeps him awake at night but it doesn’t help with hockey or anything else, so he does his best to ignore it and focuses harder on practice. And the practice does what it’s supposed to do, and he gets better and better, with all the praise and attention and pressure that goes along with it. 

The worry builds and builds, of course, and eventually there’s doctors and therapists and pills, all kinds of pills, which Jack isn’t sure about but they do seem to help a bit and they relive the worry lines on his parent’s foreheads, so he takes them and smiles and says he feels better. And he manages, and practices, and doesn’t think about a lot of things until the crowd of thoughts he isn’t thinking about grows too large in his head and he takes another pill.

And then he meets Kenny.

This should, perhaps, not be the next major transition point in the story. After all, there were a lot of important hockey milestones between the childhood revelation that half of Canada was expecting him to be the next Bad Bob and the first time he locked eyes on sixteen-year-old Kent Parson.

But this is not a hockey story (well, it isn’t primarily a hockey story) and Kent Parson is important.

(Yes, despite what any of the interested parties might say at various points, Kent Parson is important.) 

When Jack meets Kent Parson his second soulmark resolves. He doesn’t realize it at the time, the process is painless enough as to be unnoticeable amongst the chaos and confusion of the day. So, the first meeting between Jack Zimmerman and Kent Parson is the usual mix of handshakes and back-slaps and ‘good to meet you, looking forward to playing with you’-s, and a gratifyingly brief look of wide-eyed surprise on Kent’s part at the sound of Jack’s name.

It isn’t until later that Jack realizes that the soulmark-indicating smear on his chest has resolved into Kenny’s name.

It leaves a funny feeling twisting in his gut. He isn’t unhappy—Kent seems like a good guy, he loves hockey, plays well, a bit loud and over-enthusiastic but that’s common enough among the guys Jack’s played with. And the revelation of a new soulmate is supposed to be exciting, a signal of something important that will happen in your life.

But the teeth of unspecified anxiety keep nibbling away at the corner of Jack’s mind marked ‘soulmates.’ It’s not anything in particular. He can’t even figure out if it’s anything at all, other than the entire subject makes him nervous. Kenny, on the other hand, is excited as all get out, and he latches on to Jack with an enthusiasm that would make Jack suspect he wants something from him or his family like a few of the people he’s played with before have tried to do if not for the fact that a) Kent never asks for things other than to, like, practice more or for Jack to come with him to team social activities, and b) the soulmark. The soulmark means something, even if he isn’t sure what.

Kenny thinks they’re supposed to be hockey soulmates. Jack thinks that’s a pretty good guess, even though something tells him it’s maybe not exactly right. He doesn’t spend too much time thinking about why he doesn’t think they’re hockey soulmates ( _or not_ just _hockey soulmates_ , the parts of his brain he can’t quite control whisper). 

So, they play hockey—they play good hockey. And Jack works hard, and he gets better, and Kenny works hard, and he gets better. Which, okay, Jack knows he should be proud of his friend, of his soulmate, so he does his best to push down the ugly, jealous feelings that rise up in his chest whenever it’s Kenny who's playing better, whenever Kenny’s lighting up the ice and not Jack.

It’s hard, though, because he knows what people are saying, knows all the expectations heaped on him by the media, his parents, his coaches, himself. Jack’s maybe a little jealous, too, because Kenny doesn’t have to deal with all of that. He can just play.

On the ice, he plays harder, pushes all of himself even more into the practice, into the games. Off the ice, the little pills start making more and more frequent appearances in his daily routine. 

And then there’s the moment when Jack, retroactively, thinks that it all really started to go downhill. When he and Kenny kiss for the first time, shoved in a closet together for some stupid game of seven minutes in heaven. When they get back to Kenny’s room in his billet house and, after the long evening of awkward side glances and words not said on the walk over, kiss again and again, a little sloppy with the alcohol and with too much teeth, hands shoved up under sweatshirts desperately trying for as much skin contact as they can. 

It’s—it’s good. Kenny is so happy, and they’re both playing great, and Jack, in the moments he can feel anything that isn't terror or anxiety thinks that he must be falling in love with Kenny if he isn’t already because his feelings when he looks over at his soulmate—on the ice, in bed, squeezed into the back of someone’s car headed to dinner with the team—are so enormous, so overwhelming, what else could they be but love?

It’s also very, very bad. The knowledge of how people see him, what people expect of him is always if not forefront in his mind at least looming in the background. The ideas and expectations people have because of his bond with his papa taught him a lesson at a young age—that there would always be an extra layer of scrutiny on him and his soulmates, and on what that relationship meant.

He didn’t want Kenny to get pulled into that kind of public scrutiny—it’s a shitty thing to deal with and he’s already going to get some of it just on the basis of his own hockey. And he didn’t want people commenting on his relationships, using it as a way to discredit his skill on the ice. 

It builds and builds, the pressure and the emotion and the expectation, the secrets and the emotion. Jack shoves it down and takes his pills, pushes harder on the ice and drinks harder off it, throws himself into Kenny with a desperation that would frighten him if he ever gave himself the chance to stop and think about it. And, well, it works, or at least it doesn’t fail.

Until it does.

When Jack wakes up in the hospital and finds out he almost died, that he _did_ die, briefly, he can’t muster much of a reaction. When he finally gets the opportunity to call Kenny it seems like all the things Jack thinks he should be feeling have been transferred to Kent—the anger, the sadness, the rage that Jack can’t feel are directed back at him through the phone line. 

He doesn’t know what Kenny has to be upset about. Kenny got everything either of them ever wanted. 

Later, after he coaches his pee-wee kids and starts at Samwell, Jack will look back on this conversation differently. But now, in the moment, he’s to close, too overwhelmed by his own fuckup. He cuts off the pleading tirade and doesn’t pick up when Kent tries to call back. 

* * *

It’s strange, but now that Jack has made his—somewhat belated, as the analysts put it—debut in the NHL he’s happier than he’s ever been. Strange, because his happiness has hardly anything to do with the hockey.

To be clear, the hockey has been amazing. He loves the Falconers, the organization and his teammates have been great, and finally playing at the highest level is a dream come true. But it’s everything else, the things he never expected to have, that settle around him like a warm, supportive blanket and make the whole experience so much more than he ever expected.

He has parents who love and support him—they always did, he supposes, but now they actually talk and communicate so much better that he can actually internalize it. He has friends from Samwell, who like him for him and not because of his hockey. And he has Bitty.

Jack doesn’t want to be one of those people who lose themselves in a soulmate, who expects their soulmate to be anything and everything for them. That isn’t healthy, for either party. But he still can’t help how just the thought Bitty makes him smile.

They both have busy and often conflicting schedules, so it’s always a treat when they get a full weekend together. Bitty is curled up next to him on the bed pretending to do the reading for his sociology course while Jack watches tape on his laptop. Jack feels warm, and cozy, and relaxed, and this is rapidly becoming one of his favorite ways to spend a quiet night in.

It surprises him then when Bitty says, “I’ve been texting with Kent.”

Jack pauses his laptop. It doesn’t surprise him as much as it should that Bitty’s been talking to Kent. After all, he’s seen Kent’s name on Bitty’s hip countless times by now (and Bitty’s seen Kent’s name on Jack’s chest—there had been a tense conversation of meaningful silences after that revelation). He’s more shocked to hear Kent is texting back.

“Oh?” is all he says, carefully noncommittal. 

“He invited me to the Aces game in Boston next Saturday.” 

It almost makes Jack smile, how well he can read Bitty’s tells after almost two and a half years. The relaxed posture and forcibly casual phrasing don’t fool him one bit. Of course, Bitty can probably do the same for him, but fair is fair. “Are you going to go?”

“Well now, I’m not sure. I have a paper due the Monday after and I should try and get it done if I wanted to come and see you on Sunday, which I do, so I’m not sure if it would work out or not. And, you know, well, I’m just not sure if that’s something I should do. You know. Because of us.”

Jack waits a moment, letting the wash of nervous words flow over him. He isn’t sure what to make of the situation—beyond the disaster that was Epikegster and the awkward exchange of apologetic voicemails and brief phone calls afterwards, he has hardly talked to Kent in years. But he knows how much all of his soulmate connections mean to Eric.

“If you want to go to the game, you should go to the game,” he says, choosing his words slowly, carefully. “Don’t make up excuses because you’re nervous. Avoidance never helps, believe me.” It’s strangely easy for him to say. 

For all he’s spent years avoiding Kent and his own complicated feelings about the man, he feels surprisingly calm. The well of jealousy he would expect from telling the soulmate he is currently dating to consider pursuing a potential romantic relationship with the mutual soulmate who is also his ex-boyfriend is simply not there. That might bear some examining later. 

Bitty seems to shrink in on himself at his words. “Hey, it’s okay,” Jack says, wrapping his arms around him. “It’s your choice. There’s no wrong answer.”

Slowly Bitty nods, his face pressed into Jack’s shoulder. “I know,” he says, his voice muffled. “I’m just nervous. I don't want to mess anything up.”

“You want to go?”

“Yes.”

“Okay. Then go. There’s no pressure. It’s just a game. You’ll talk after? Get dinner?” 

“I don’t know. Maybe?”

“Okay, that’s a plan. All you have to do is watch some hockey, talk to someone you’re interested in getting to know better, and maybe eat some food. It’s all stuff you know and like, bud, hockey, food and talking. You should have no problem.”

That spurs a laugh out of Bitty. “Hey,” he protests, but he’s smiling when he tilts his face up and presses a kiss to Jack’s chin.

“You’re going to be just fine,” Jack says, before leaning in to kiss Bitty’s lips. “We’re going to be fine.” 

* * *

Eric Bittle has thirteen soulmates. His classmates back in Georgia used to harass him for that—unlucky number thirteen, what else could be expected of someone as _freakish_ as him—but it was no worse than half the things they threw at him and nothing could change the affection, the _rightness_ he felt at the sight of the swirling, indistinct stripes that crept down his thighs and around his torso. 

Thirteen. A baker’s dozen of soulmates. There was something appropriate about that. It fit.

His Moo Maw had laughed when he’d told her that, but in the loud, delighted way she would whenever she was particularly tickled. Her name swooped in perfect cursive along his right shoulder blade, one of only two of the thirteen that had so far resolved. Eric’s mama said that was probably why they were so close, although he thought it was more of a chicken and egg situation.

Were they close because they were soulmates, or were they soulmates because they were close? Eric was content to leave that sort of speculation to the scientists and to the so-called ‘soulmate consultants’ who frequented the daytime television talk shows that his mama wouldn’t let him watch but his Aunt Judy liked to have on in the background when she was doing housework. It didn’t matter to him why he’d matched with his Moo Maw, just that he had.

It was simple for him to figure out what impact his Moo Maw was meant to have on him—the smell of butter baking into pastry, the feel of pie crust working to the perfect consistency between his fingers, the tastes of chocolate and cream and coconut on his tongue all embedded themselves into his earliest memories accompanied by her smile and patient instructions. And whenever Eric would worry that he wasn’t helping his Moo Maw back the way the soulmark said he would she’d just laugh and say “you’ll understand when you have your own grandchildren. You just keep being yourself, kiddo, that’s all you have to do.”

Being himself was a bit of a problem, though, for Eric. He knew what he liked to do: baking with his Moo Maw and his mama, listening to music and dancing in the living room, watching the figure skaters in their sparkly outfits on tv and going to the local rink to try and recreate their routines even though the rental skates hurt his feet. He also knew the sorts of things he was supposed to like: football, fishing, cars, hunting. Especially football.

Most of the boys at school had a mark that matched with their daddies, same as the girls often enough had ones that matched with their mamas, and there Eric was, not only bearing thirteen marks but not one of them Coach’s and the only two resolved as his grandmother and his figure skating instructor. Eric had always secretly wondered why he didn’t have his mama’s mark—which still would have made him weird at school but would have made sense, he thought, overall—but markings could be strange and arbitrary, and anyway he never asked his mama because it just would have hurt her, and Coach even if he never would have shown it. 

It was all just one more thing to mark him out as different, that was all.

Overall, though, Eric was okay with his soulmarks. He was okay with having thirteen, he loved having a match with his Moo Maw. He was grateful to have matched with Katya the day she looked him up and down and asked if he had a coach (he wasn’t sure Coach would have said no otherwise, but the line of squat, Cyrillic letters on Eric’s upper arm had certainly helped convince him and Eric’s mama that it was something to try). 

He was even okay with the fact that he was almost eighteen years old and he’d only had two of his soulmarks resolve—and the last one to do so had been over ten years ago. Because Eric Bittle was secretly a romantic, and he couldn’t help but hope that at least one of his soulmate connections would be a romantic one. 

It wasn’t a particularly unlikely situation, he knew—loads of people had romantic soulmates, his parents were romantic soulmates. And he had thirteen (now eleven) possible matches any of whom could be his own romantic soulmate. But a lot of people didn’t have romantic soulmates, too. People fell in love and got married without a soulmate connection all the time, even sometimes to people who had other romantic soulmates. 

(Yes, Eric lived in Georgia where such things still raised disapproving eyebrows, but he had the internet and he had his Moo Maw’s stories about growing up in a multi-parent household during the Depression before going to work in New Orleans during the war. He knew not everyone thought the same as the people he went to school with.) 

And some people had romantic soulmates but still ended up with someone else anyway.

But, despite the statistics, and the fact that he knew that people could be perfectly happy with partners who weren’t their soulmates, he really hoped that at least one of his marks would turn out to be a romantic connection. For one, it would be a good explanation for why he’d only had two of his marks resolve so far—small-town Georgia wasn’t exactly a great place for a gay boy looking for his romantic soulmate, after all. And for another, a small, slightly bitter part of him pointed out, if he had a romantic soulmate it would vindicate the part of him that always knew he wanted to kiss boys and not girls. 

There was something binding, something permanent, about a soulmate, something beyond the prejudices of any small town and if your partner was your soulmate people had to accept that, more or less grudgingly. Maybe that wasn’t right, maybe you weren’t supposed to think of a soulmate relationship as proving something to people who hate you, but Bitty had spent eighteen years as the person he was in the place that he lived, and as much as he tried his darnedest to smile and be nice and think positive, that kind of thing was going to leave a mark. 

But now he was going to Samwell! 

Samwell, with the rainbow flags on its recruitment brochures, and the ‘one in four, maybe more’ banner across the top of the website, seemed like about as far from Madison, Georgia as was possible to get, and just the place for a gay boy looking for his romantic soulmate to go. 

But, yes, he was going to be on the hockey team. And that certainly worried him. Sure, Eric knew he was pretty good at hockey—he might not have the experience of the other guys on the team, and there was the unfortunate fact that he still had to learn how to take a check without freezing up, but you didn’t get a sports scholarship to a Division I school if the coaches didn’t see _something_ valuable in the way you played—but he was a bit worried about getting along with the, _ahem_ , hockey bros.

He’s chosen Samwell for the open, inviting atmosphere (and the scholarship), but in Eric’s experience athletes of the large and physical variety were, well, large and physical. And not exactly welcoming to small, touch-averse, and gay folks like him. It was fortunate, he supposed, that Madison wasn’t much of a hockey town (or really concerned itself with anything that wasn’t football at all.) His no-contact rec league had been probably sixty percent girls and the rest boys who didn’t take it seriously enough to get buff and mostly weren’t too tall.

It had been a good environment to learn how to play without having to worry about being run over by giants. Eric had probably had the best skating skills of all of them, though there were a couple of girls a few years younger than him who were hoping to make the NCAA who were definitely better players. He’d been able to trade skating tips for pointers on his game.

But Samwell. But the Samwell hockey team.

Samwell meant NCAA hockey and that meant checking and it meant teammates who’d played since they were little kids and maybe even in Juniors and who definitely had more in common with Coach's football players than with pie-making former figure skater Eric Bittle. Eric knew that could definitely end up being a problem, for his scholarship and for his ‘Eric finds a romantic soulmate’ plan, even at a school as apparently tolerant as Samwell. 

He knew it made his mother worry too, even if she didn’t have the full picture. Whereas Coach had just given him a gruff nod and a slap on the shoulder when he announced that he would be taking Samwell’s offer instead of going to UGA, his mama’s proud smile was matched with worried tears. 

So, he knows Samwell probably won’t be perfect. But there is no time to worry about all of that now. Samwell, Massachusetts, here he comes!

* * *

It’s always a late night when the Falconers play the Aces. Even more so when it’s a home game in Providence and Bitty can find the time between his own hockey responsibilities and that ever-looming thesis deadline to come up for the game, or at least to Jack’s apartment after. This time is more of the latter—the pressure of senior year coursework not being at all considerate of Bitty’s limited time with his boyfriends—but he listens to the game on his phone on the train ride up and lets himself in to Jack’s apartment in time to tune in to the last five minutes. 

The game is tight, the Aces down by one, and neither team is willing to give an inch as the clock winds down. Bitty bites his lip as Snowy denies Kent’s final attempt to tie the game. The clock hits zero, the arena of fans decked in blue cheer, and soon enough Jack is being awkward in an interview before the channel cuts back to the studio.

Bitty leaves the TV on as he makes his way into the kitchen, but he mutes it. It’s never so much fun to hear the commentary when the players being talked about are Jack and Kent, and especially when it’s both Jack and Kent in the same game, but he wants to see the highlights.

Jack left out a couple of take-out menus on the counter and Bitty flips through the selections. It will still be a while before Jack and Kent get home, but he places an order at the Thai place anyway. There’s a small, private smile on his face as he tucks the menus away in their drawer and pulls out the bowls and measuring cups to get to work on a quick fruit crumble. 

He’s always known sharing food was the same as sharing love. He’d known that since the first time his Moo Maw fed him a bite of her peach pie, then taught him how to make it. But something as small as knowing someone’s order from a favorite restaurant, that is new. It’s not the same, he thinks, as making someone their favorite pie or cooking up a pot of chicken noodle soup from scratch when someone is sick. But it’s a kind of love and care all the same.

The crumble goes in the oven, the take-out is delivered and moved swiftly into the warming drawer, and the dirty dishes and baking equipment are moved into the sink as Bitty bides his time. He’s still up to his elbows in soap suds, humming along to his washing up playlist, when the lock at the front door rattles and the sounds of his two cheerfully arguing boyfriends spill in.

“I’m telling you, geese are vicious, I wouldn’t fight one goose size goose, let alone one the size of a horse.”

“Geese are strong and to be respected but there is no reason a giant one could not be defeated with adequate preparation and a solid plan.”

Bitty can’t help but laugh as he’s greeted by Jack and Kent’s smiling faces in the kitchen doorway, followed swiftly by a pair of kisses to the cheek.

“You two get back here,” he says, waving a dripping hand indigent as he’s abandoned for the refrigerator and bottles of Gatorade. “I want proper kisses; I haven’t seen either of you in weeks.”

“You saw me last weekend,” Jack points out, but obligingly returns for a long, deep, lingering kiss.

Kent waits for Bitty to dry his hands off before wrapping him in a warm, solid hug and sliding a hand into his hair to cup his head and pressing his own series of sweet, open-mouthed kisses to Bitty’s lips.

“You taste like artificial grape,” Bitty says, nose crinkled in distaste.

“Do you want me to stop?”

“No.” Bitty curls his fingers through Kent’s still-damp hair and pulls him back down into another kiss.

When the beeping from the kitchen timer eventually prompts them to pull apart, the mood is still warm and cozy, not hot and frantic, which probably bodes well for the evening staying on plan. In the meantime, Jack has pulled the take out from the warming drawer and set out plates and utensils on the table. 

Bitty checks the crumble and sets it aside to cool, dinner is dished up and eaten, and the dirty dishes are finally dealt with in their entirety. It’s Jack’s turn to pick the movie, so he queues up whatever documentary he’d been eyeing on Netflix while Kent helps Bitty serve up dessert, scooping still-warm crumble into bowls and adding just a spoonful of vanilla ice cream to melt over top.

Because it’s Jack’s choice they’re watching a documentary, but because the three of them have, over the course of the last year or so, gained a lot of practice in the art of compromise (also because they’ve learned that passive-aggressive media choices are ultimately counterproductive), they’re watching a documentary about wild cats. Kent grin as the first snow leopard bounds across the screen is wide and delighted and Bitty and Jack’s eyes meet with secret, knowing grins.

Bitty wonders sometimes, how weird it must be for Jack and Kent, with the competition and professional rivalry that is an inherent part of their professional lives. From what he’s gleaned about their relationship as teenagers, that aspect of external pressure had exacerbated the issues between them, at least on Jack’s side. But now, as adults, things seem more balanced. Or, maybe they, as individuals are more balanced. Whatever it is, seeing the quiet ways his boyfriends care for one another kindles something soft and warm in Bitty’s chest and brings a smile to his face.

The couch is large enough to accommodate the bulk of two professional hockey players comfortably, but Bitty has to squish a little to fit between them. It’s not like he minds, though, pressed up against his two favorite people, arms wrapped around shoulders, all cozy and snuggly. 

Bitty strokes one hand through Jack’s hair as cheetah kittens tumble across the television screen; the other hand is entwined in one of Kent’s. He can just see the top loop of the ‘E’ of his name, sticking out from under the collar of Kent’s shirt. The lines of his name looping below the base of Kent’s neck are a familiar enough sight that Bitty can picture the rest of the mark effortlessly. The thought makes him smile, and look over at Jack.

Jack, who, even relaxed and cuddly, is frowning in concentration at the documentary, mentally chewing over something the narrator said that Bitty missed. There are still cute cats on the screen, though, so he isn’t too worried. His eyes find the spot where his mark resides, Bitty’s loopy cursive unashamedly apparent on Jack’s bare arm. The spot on Jack’s chest where Kent’ name scrawls with the slap-dash, slanting letters of a teenager, is just as obvious to him even through the obstruction of a shirt.

He is so lucky, Bitty thinks as he lets his fingers play over Kent’s mark of Jack’s name, that he gets to have these two men in his life. Middle school Eric, mad and scared and angry and defiant when it came to thoughts of his future, had never have been able to guess in all of his wildest daydreams how good the truth of having partners, soulmates, boyfriends.

Platonic soulmates, too. He doesn’t know what he would do, where he would be without Shitty, or Lardo, or Ransom and Holster, or the Frogs and Shruti and even Johnson, though those last five weren’t technically his soulmates. He’s been so fortunate to have so many amazing people come into his life since he came to Samwell, and dating Jack and Kent is just the icing on the cake. 

Two kind, thoughtful, talented, charming, and handsome men, such complete opposites in so many ways and yet so alike in others. Both Bitty’s soulmates, and both soulmates with each other. And both wanting and willing to date _him_. Some days he can’t believe how lucky he is.

“Is everything alright?” Jack’s question draws Bitty from his reverie. The contemplative frown has turned from the documentary to him. “Are you tired?”

Bitty shakes his head and settles down more firmly into the press of his boyfriends’ bodies. “I’m okay,” he says, “just thinking.”

“About?”

“How lucky I am to have you two in my life.”

Jack’s expression melts into a sappy sweet smile, but the effect is counteracted by Kent going “wow, that’s sappy as fuck.” Bitty elbows him in the ribs.

The moment is broken and degenerates into laughter, the documentary running forgotten on the TV. It is switched off and abandoned a moment later as the late hour translates into bedtime, and the tired, sappy trio make their way to curl up together in their larger, much more accommodating bed.

_Lucky indeed_ , Bitty thinks, almost incredulous as he drifts off to sleep. _Lucky indeed_.


End file.
